How can I make Visual Studio wrap lines at 80 characters?

Question

Is there any way to make Visual Studio word-wrap at 80 characters? I'm using VS2008.

This post is loosely related.

Is this a personal thing, or do you have an instructor for a class that requires it? I would find line wrapping at all rather... restrictive to my coding style, as I like to use long descriptive names for things. ^_^ — Blank, Oct 25 '08 at 14:54
I'm with Nicholas Flynt - restricting code to 80 characters per line is typical for uni assignments, but is in my opinion rather unproductive in The Real World[TM]. — OregonGhost, Oct 25 '08 at 17:21
Maybe 80 is too restrictive... but I prefer a relatively narrow setting because it lets me see the whole statement at once, without auto-hiding the toolbox and other auxiliary windows. — JosephStyons, Oct 29 '08 at 17:55
Restrict column width has many advantages. Read this: http://www.cookcomputing.com/blog/archives/000545.html See this: http://vulcan.eager.googlepages.com/whereis.png — Agnel Kurian, Dec 17 '08 at 07:48
I always allow word wrap for everything except Python, where it's confusing - precisely because I like to use long, descriptive names and want to see everything on the line, not just the first bit — thepeer, Mar 11 '10 at 14:59
@thepeer In my opinion, if your names are long enough to force word-wrapping, they are probably too long to be easily readable, which actually makes your code *harder* to understand. (Though my experience is based on trying to read lots of code with long "descriptive" names bordering on the pathological--some method names were 80+ characters on their own.) — Kyle Strand, Mar 29 '17 at 17:28
@KyleStrand I'm with you. I find code a lot more understandable if I can view it on one screen. When I posted this 8 years ago, I was a little more dogmatic about wanting my 80 characters (because if its good enough for a console, its good enough for studio!). Now, I'm happy if i can just see everything at a reasonable font size. — JosephStyons, Mar 29 '17 at 20:37
I got here looking for a way to *hard* wrap a block comment. (I agree with others that auto-wrapping code is not likely to be that useful, though some amount of discipline in limiting line length in comments and code can help when diffing during code reviews, etc.) Not finding what I was looking for, I did find this rewrap tool: https://marketplace.visualstudio.com/items?itemName=stkb.rewrap Haven't tried it, but it looks like it would do the job. — Tom Bogle, May 01 '20 at 14:50
.editorconfig files have a setting for this, but VS does not support it. You can upvote the request to add that support here: https://developercommunity.visualstudio.com/t/support-max-line-length-in-editorconfig-for-visual/567214 — kevinpo, Apr 06 '23 at 17:45

score 129 · Answer 1 · edited Dec 24 '22 at 21:05

129

Unless someone can recommend a free tool to do this, you can achieve this with ReSharper:

ReSharper >> Options... >> Languages/C# >> Line Breaks and Wrapping

Check "Wrap long lines"
Set "Right Margin (columns)" to the required value (default is 120)

edited Dec 24 '22 at 21:05

starball

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answered Oct 26 '08 at 22:45

Igal Tabachnik

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In R# 8.x it's under RESHARPER >> Options >> Code Editing >> C# >> Formatting Style >> Line Breaks and Wrapping – Vlad Bezden Mar 06 '14 at 22:33
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In Visual Studio 2019 (with ReSharper 2020.1) the path is now Extensions >> ReSharper >> Options >> Code Editing >> C# >> Formatting Style >> Line Breaks and Wrapping – Mike Grove aka Theophilus Jul 17 '20 at 18:51

score 80 · Accepted Answer · answered Oct 25 '08 at 14:56

80

Tools >> Options >> Text Editor >> All Languages >> General >> Select Word Wrap.

I dont know if you can select a specific number of columns?

answered Oct 25 '08 at 14:56

TGnat

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VS 2013: no option for the number of columns; However the wrap is adjusted if you change the size of the VS window. – Guilherme Salomé May 13 '15 at 19:22
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I do not think this is the wanted behavior, at least not what I want. Is there a way to set the width of a line ? – sop Jun 21 '18 at 08:11

score 37 · Answer 3 · answered Oct 25 '08 at 15:10

37

I don't think you can make VS wrap at 80 columns (I'd find that terribly annoying) but you can insert a visual guideline at 80 columns so you know when is a good time to insert a newline.

Details on inserting a guideline at 80 characters for 3 different versions of visual studio.

answered Oct 25 '08 at 15:10

Stewart Johnson

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Alternative link: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/84209/adding-a-guideline-to-the-editor-in-visual-studio – user9876 Mar 12 '10 at 11:34

score 25 · Answer 4 · edited Aug 03 '16 at 14:08

25

You can also use

Ctrl+E, Ctrl+W

keyboard shortcut to toggle wrap lines on and off.

edited Aug 03 '16 at 14:08

Gh61

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answered Mar 05 '15 at 17:06

Cory Koch

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Thanks, does it stay enabled for all files forever, or just the session? – eozzy Feb 09 '17 at 23:09
thanks for this shortcut...I misstype this a lot and always have to google where to disable it. gonna put this on a post-it not for sure – Mario Garcia Aug 19 '19 at 11:38

score 9 · Answer 5 · answered Mar 23 '09 at 23:21

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To do this with Visual Assist (another non-free tool):

VAssistX >> Visual Assist X Options >> Advanced >> Display

Check "Display indicator after column" and set the number field to 80.

answered Mar 23 '09 at 23:21

idbrii

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Now under VAssistX >> Visual AssistX Options >> Display – Eponymous Mar 25 '15 at 14:46

score 5 · Answer 6 · answered Jul 27 '15 at 20:18

5

Adds vertical column guides to the Visual Studio text editor. This version is for Visual Studio 2012, Visual Studio 2013 or Visual Studio 2015.

See the plugin.

answered Jul 27 '15 at 20:18

score 5 · Answer 7 · answered Mar 01 '18 at 18:55

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I stumbled upon this question when was actually searching for an answer to this one (how to add a visual line/guideline at char limit). So I would like to leave a ref to it here for anyone like myself.

answered Mar 01 '18 at 18:55

Corio

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HelloGoodbye · Answer 8 · 2019-08-12T12:56:36.583

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If the problem is simply that you want to know when you pass 80 characters for a single line, which is a common coding guideline limit, you can use a different approach: Editor Guidelines. This will add vertical column guides behind your code.

edited Aug 12 '19 at 12:56

answered Oct 12 '18 at 12:39

HelloGoodbye

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score 0 · Answer 9 · edited Jun 20 '20 at 09:12

0

See also this answer in order to switch the mode conveniently.

Citation:

I use this feature often enough that I add a custom button to the command bar.

Click on the Add or Remove -> Customize
Click on the Commands tab
Select Edit|Advanced from the list
Find Toggle Word Wrap and drag it onto your bar

edited Jun 20 '20 at 09:12

Community

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answered Jan 04 '15 at 16:22

Roland Pihlakas

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score 0 · Answer 10 · answered Dec 08 '22 at 19:32

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You can enable word wrap and set zoom of code for 207% and that will show wrap every line of code that is over 80 characters in length.

answered Dec 08 '22 at 19:32

niros calfon

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This seams to work only on a specific resolution screem – fsbflavio Dec 13 '22 at 12:30

How can I make Visual Studio wrap lines at 80 characters?

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